PSYCH: "Black & Tan: A Crime of Fashion" Review

Shawn and Gus join the fabulous world of fashion models.

The mystery in this episode of PSYCH centered on a husband and wife team of clothing designers, one of whom was conveniently murdered during a fashion show minutes after Shawn and Gus crashed the party. The two detectives must then go undercover as fashion models to get to the bottom of the case.

Shawn and Gus once again find themselves trying to adapt to a situation they know nothing about. In this case, it's the world of fashion. It's a great premise as every one of us has pre-conceived notions about what the fashion world is like and how most of it is ripe for parody. Unfortunately, this episode didn't go much further than addressing the most basic stereotypes of how models are shallow, vapid and self-centered. Even a slight departure from these basic stereotypes would've done a lot to make this episode funnier.

As we've stated time and time again, PSYCH is more about the comedy and less about an interesting mystery. With this episode, we would've accepted either one. Whereas earlier this season, the back-and-forth dialogue that made the show great came at a fast and furious pace, these last two episodes have just fallen short in that regard. Sure, there were some funny moments here and there, particularly with their model names: Black and Tan and the pillow fight scene, but overall, it seems like many of the jokes were re-hashed from the "Lights, Camera…Homicidio" episode two weeks ago.

In that episode, Shawn went undercover as an actor in order to solve a murder on the set of a Spanish soap opera. Following in the footsteps of every other soap opera actor on the planet, he shamefully mugged for the camera in what were some very funny scenes. In this episode, he and Gus posed as models to solve a murder and did the same mugging to try and fit in, but this time, the joke didn't work quite as well.

Dule Hill as Burton 'Gus' Guster, James Roday as Shawn Spencer

The other running gag in the soap opera episode was how no one wanted to admit they were fans of the daytime soap, and yet by the end, everyone was wrapped up in its plot twists. In this episode, the same thing happened: no one wanted to admit they were interested in fashion, but by the time the credits rolled, Lassiter had changed his suit and bought a new tie, O'Hara caused jaws to drop with her new outfit and Shawn and Gus were consumed by their own clothing. Again, too many of the elements in this episode felt stale because we had seen them just two weeks ago.

Another key issue with the show lately has been the absence of demonstrations of Shawn's fake psychic powers. They can be silly at times, but they're also a great source of comedy when written well. Often, they're the springboard for great dialogue between Shawn and Gus and the SBPD. In these last two episodes, Shawn has had only one or two brief psychic episodes, and that's a bad sign for the future. It is the entire premise for the show, after all.

The secondary story in this episode involved Shawn's dad, Henry getting back into the dating circle. Fixed up with Police Chief Vick's single friend, Susan, Henry spent the episode asking Shawn for advice about women because he's so out of the loop. Information regarding Shawn's mom has been vague throughout the series so far and with the PSYCH season finale coming up next week, this curious turn of events in Henry's life seems like a set-up for a big event. We'll just have to wait and see.